Full Time Hero
by Borrow Your Soul
Summary: Years after the world accepted ghosts, terrorism hits an accidental target. It's the end of Daniel Fenton, forever. The now permanent Phantom has to learn to see the world through new eyes, and learn the true meaning of "afterlife".
1. Chapter 1

**Setting: Several years after Phantom Planet. Assumed from that episode that even though the world knows Danny Phantom and accepts him, only that group of strangers and his parents saw him turn back into Danny Fenton. So there are rumors, but his identity is still pretty safe. Correct if wrong, will just make it a total AU then.**

**

* * *

**

Chapter 1:

Jazz turned down the radio a few notches as she turned a corner, not liking the overplayed song that came on. She had used to like it, but hearing it over and over every time she got into a car for the past week ending up making the girl detest it. Still, she couldn't help but bop her head at the beat.

She kept an eye out at the buildings. Danny's apartment Jazz had been to many times before, but it didn't make it any easier to find by aesthetics. Every complex on the street was practically identical.

Fake brick red the buildings were, with an even amount of windows on each side. Two bushes out in front, though some were not in the best of health and others overgrown. Who gardened these things anyway? Each complex had a certain distance apart from each other to form a small side street, but from lack of use they became more similar to open alleys. Very dark in them at night, not a place the girl would like to meet anyone.

The sidewalk cement cracked and bundled up together like an accordion years ago; a hazard for anyone wanting to actually walk on it but a blessing for the kids who needed a few ramps to do tricks on. Jazz observed some teenager wipe out on his skateboard as she passed by. He looked as if it wasn't the first time, so she didn't make an effort to stop and help.

Needless to say, her brother chose the place for a different reason than the looks. It was close to Jazz and Fenton Works, along with his and Tucker's colleges. Roommates that didn't want the dorms and needed a place only a best friend could share without killing each other. Tucker was paranoid that his precious electronics would be stolen by his roommate, or move one of the cords on the floor. The nicely labeled cords. Yes he was mayor, yes he could live somewhere nicer, yes he didn't even need to go to college, but he did. A few years into that business made the boy realize politics weren't really his thing, and was planning on getting out next election and getting a career dealing with what he loved instead.

Danny just needed fewer questions. Dorm mates asked too many and saw too much. Jazz sighed when she remembered his first year, and the phone calls; he had learned the hard way that lesson. Rooming with Tucker was an ideal solution.

She refocused her attention to the buildings. "Fourth one on the right, fourth one on the right," Jazz recounted aloud, slowing the car a little. She passed a complex that faded to pink faster than the others, one with completely dead shrubbery, and one that was roped off with police tape, with various cars gathered around. The girl tried to avert her eyes from whatever scene it was and maneuvered around the stopped vehicles; it was rude to stare.

One had childen's toys discarded all over the place, another had the children, fighting each other dramatically with sticks and a fake sword. The place after that she didn't recognize. Or the next one.

At the stop sign in front of a four-way, Jazz knew she had passed it. Again. Red hair swished back and forth as she craned her head in all directions, seeing if she could spot the missed building. The girl backed into an empty driveway past the four-way and turned her car around. "Maybe it was the fourth one on the left, which would be on the right now."

Back past the children and their toys on the left, past some dog on a leash that wasn't allowed here on the right.

Her heart sank. As she approached the building, the correct one, now on the left, it was easy to see why she had missed it. The car slowed to a crawl. An ambulance and two police cars were up ahead. Something dropped in Jazz's stomach.

It was the taped-off building.

She parallel parked a safe distance from the commotion and got out of her car. Slamming the door shut was a shaking hand, which she rested on the vehicle afterward. The other went to rub the girl's forehead therapeutically. "Danny, what did you do?" was the million dollar question.

An officer stopped Jazz as she got too close to the tape. It was a thin-lipped woman with a glint in her eyes and a butch haircut. "You're not allowed any farther."

"I need to get in," Jazz told the officer. Her eyes then followed a gurney being pulled slowly and steadily to the ambulance. A body bag was resting on top. Her heart might as well stopped. That is, until one of the paramedics, new to the job she reasoned, slipped on the disturbed sidewalk and accidentally pulled on the bag's zipper as he fell. A black toe peeked out, as if to get fresh air. That wasn't her brother.

"I can't let you in, sorry," the woman reclaimed the redhead's attention. "Why are you here, a witness?"

"Uh, no. I'm actually here to visit my uh," the building in front of them seemed to loom ominously with every word Jazz spoke, "brother. He lives here."

The officer's face immediately softened; the glint disappeared. "Oh." She was suddenly speaking in a friendlier, almost comforting tone. "I'm sorry. It's too dangerous for civilians to go in right now; they haven't deemed the area safe yet. We're having a hard enough time getting our own in there to see what happened." The girl noticed the paramedics she was distracted by were wearing masks. "I'm sorry," the woman repeated.

"What happened?" Jazz asked steadily. Did it involve ghosts? Did she want to know? Truly?

"From what I've heard, an underground gas leak. CO. No one knew it was there." The woman gestured to her face, "Obviously, I haven't been in there," she wasn't wearing a mask, "but that's what it seems to be."

"I see." The world became a little hazy. Questions she wanted to ask rose like water to the top of her mind, flooding, overflowing, but couldn't release. Did a ghost break the pipeline? Did Danny take his work home again? How many bodies? How many people died because of it?

And more importantly, Danny and Tucker. Are they...?

The woman again refocused Jazz's attention. She had noticeably spaced out. "I'm going to need your name."

"Jasmine Fenton." She could hardly look at the officer; the building was engulfing her.

"And you said one of the tenants was your brother, yes?"

"_Is_. Daniel Fenton. He _is_ my brother," she corrected.

"Alright," the officer said, and whipped out a notepad to write the information down. The handwriting was sharp, like the rest of her. When she wasn't trying to be sympathetic.

Jazz hardly paid attention to the next questions asked. Her eyes wandered. They couldn't look at the building. Anywhere but the building. She took in the details of the alley instead. Counting the bricks. Until she noticed a faint glow from behind some of the junk stored in there, and a movement of snow-white hair. "I have to go," she told the officer.

The woman probably tried to see what she was looking at, but wasn't nearly as observant and let her go. That place wasn't off-limits anyway, so it wasn't her problem.

Jazz started to walk away. A hand grabbed her sleeve. She turned; it was the officer again, holding out a small piece of paper. "My card," she told the girl with those thin lips. "Just in case. We'll try to contact you if we get any more information, but just in case." The woman sure did like to repeat things.

She quickly looked to make sure the glow didn't disappear, then took the card and put it in her pocket. "Thank you, Officer."

She then walked as fast as she could to the alley without attracting attention.

Since no one had much of a reason to use the side street, the apartment residents began putting junk there. Old boxes, broken furniture, a few garbage cans for the lazy who didn't want to walk all the way to the end of the street to deposit their trash in the big one. Soon, not only did no one want to take the side street, no one _could_. The space allotted for a car became too small. And for a half-ghost wanting to avoid the authorities, it was the perfect place to hide until his sister showed up.

"Danny?" Jazz whispered, "You there?" She didn't want to scare him. A trauma like the one next to them was enough to shake even him, and she knew she had to proceed cautiously. Learning psychology at an early age had its benefits. "I'm alone, don't worry. The police didn't follow me." She walked to where the glowing was most noticeable and looked behind a refrigerator box.

Luckily, it was indeed Danny Phantom sitting there, legs close to his chest, back to the fake brick, and not some other ghost. She didn't bring the thermos for that sort of occasion, which would have made the situation end badly.

The boy's hair was over his face, almost smushed between his legs and chest, the familiar glowing green eyes unable to see.

She noticed that if he had gotten in a fight in the building, he had long since healed; no physical wounds she could see. There was only the mental. The emotional. Those she was better at dealing with.

The ghost's posture shifted slightly at her presence. "Hi," he said into his suit.

"I'm glad you waited for me," Jazz told him. Even though it was morning, the alley was still relatively dark, throwing shadows on the siblings. She glanced back at the crime scene with its marked tape and people milling about. It wasn't long until a film crew got whiff, not to mention some of the officers started looking more outside, as they couldn't all go in. Only a matter of time before they checked between the buildings. "We should go soon, though. Can you stand?"

Obviously he could, but the question was not literal. What the girl really wanted to know was if her brother was _ready_ to stand, able to start moving forward away from the apartment.

"I guess."

She hated when he was like this, so... unresponsive. It hadn't been this bad before, she could tell. The closest to now was when he and Jack got into their first fight after their parents found out, and by mere instinct, her father whipped out an ecto gun and aimed it at his half-and-half son. He didn't mean to do so, and wasn't intent in the slightest to shoot Danny, and they both knew that, but it shook him up for a while.

Hopefully, this would take just a while as well.

"Danny," she said softly, "look at me." She gently touched his knees, gesturing for them to unfold. "It's not your fault. Whatever happened, it'll be OK in the end. It always is."

"It doesn't feel OK," he murmured, but cooperatively put his legs down so she could at least see a little of his face.

"Then it's not the end yet." She smiled. He gave a small one to the floor as well.

"That is so cheesy."

Jazz lifted his chin a little with her finger. Gentle and slow seemed to be the best method with him for now. "Well, it worked, didn't it?"

Danny finally looked at her, and it took all of the girl's self control not flinch back or embrace him in a crushing hug. The ghost looked exhausted, like he needed a good rest with a soft pillow. His eyes were unnaturally brighter and at the same time duller than usual, if possible. His face wore agony under that little smile and his body shimmered with less control of transparency.

"Can you stand?" she asked again. The officers were really looking at the alley now; they had maybe a few minutes. "We should get going," she said with a hint of urgency. Her brother took notice of the same scene and nodded. Unsteadily, he used the wall to help himself up, legs shaking.

Without warning, he turned invisible. "What are you doing?" Instead of responding, Jazz felt a hand move her head in the oncoming direction. The officer from earlier was walking towards them.

"Hello Jasmine," the woman took it upon herself to use first name basis after only speaking with her for a few minutes. "Everything all right?"

"I'll be in the car," came a cold whisper in the girl's ear, and then the temperature rose noticeably. He was fast.

She was quick to distract the woman from noticing anything. A natural ability, as she had been doing it for years. "Hello Officer. Everything's fine." Don't notice the temperature please, or that sudden wind. It's nothing, I assure you.

"What are you doing in here?" The woman's voice was consoling, but the glint had returned to her eyes in suspicion. "Girls shouldn't hang out in dark places unarmed, even if it is early in the morning."

"I was just," Jazz paused, searching around for a legitimate reason. "I was just looking for signs of my brother." Well, it wasn't technically a lie.

The officer's glint immediately disappeared. "Ah, alright. I understand." She adjusted her posture a little uncomfortably. "I think you should go home now, though. We need to check this area out as well."

"I will. Thank you for the concern, ma'am." The girl tried to walk as if her brother was not in the car, invisibly waiting for her.

She gave another sigh, this time of relief, once in the driver's seat with the vehicle started. Danny reappeared, and she pulled away from the scene, just in time to see a news van take her spot. Eager little parasites.

The ghost had returned to a similar position as in the side street, only this time with his face lying against the backseat cushions. She thought she had made some progress, but it was apparently a wrong assumption. "Danny," Jazz addressed him, "please sit up, you'll hit your head lying like that."

He mumbled a response between his folded legs.

"I couldn't hear you," she said, trying to sound as nice as possible but still exert authority; she couldn't just let him mope when he wants, especially when it could lead to him getting harmed if she took a sharp turn. "Could you please sit up and tell me that again?"

He did as told, like a puppet, and sat up into a slouching position in the backseat. "I said it doesn't matter."

"Sure it does, your brain is a very important organ and needs to be protected." A stoplight changed to red and Jazz braked. She took the opportunity and turned to look at him. "Speaking of important organs, put your seat belt on."

"No."

A deep breath in, a deep breath out. This was most definitely not the time to snap at him, but he was testing her. "Danny, you need to put it on. Just because you are in ghost form does not mean you can't get hurt from a car accident." The girl pointed a finger at her brother. "Which is what we are going to get in if you make come back there."

"Green light," he stated.

A car horn behind them agreed with him. Jazz went back to driving. Annoyed, she did not speak, and her brother wasn't one to fill the conversation when in one of his moods. It was silent. A click came from the back as the seat belt snapped into place at one point, and she couldn't help but smile.

Only when they passed a few recognizable landmarks did Danny break the quiet. "Where are we going?"

"Mom and Dad's."

"No!" The sudden response and sheer volume of the ghost's response was enough to make her swerve. He leaned forward in the seat. "No," he repeated, much softer the second time, "please, not yet." It sounded so defeated coming from him.

Jazz tried to reason behind her brother's outburst. "They're not going to punish you, Danny. I'm sure the apartment, whatever happened there, wasn't your fault."

He slumped back into his seat. "It's... not that. I just," he paused, "I just can't face them yet."

Understandable with the levels of stress the boy was dealing with. "I'll take the long way then, how about that?"

Danny didn't say anything. He rubbed his gloved hands over his face and tried to curl up again, only to have the effort thwarted by the seat belt. She was surprised to hear him choke back a sob. "Danny?"

"I need to tell you something."

The redhead hesitated before answering. "Is this something that can't wait for Mom and Dad?" He really needed a parent at the moment, something she could not pretend to be.

The tone of his voice was flat and final. "Jazz, I think I'm dead."

Without warning, she changed lanes and turned into the Nasty Burger parking lot without a turn signal, cutting someone off. It still hadn't converted to a twenty-four hour shift like its fast food rivals, so the place was deserted this early in the morning. Jazz parked the car and undid her seat belt before climbing into the backseat.

She embraced the ghost tightly, as if he blow away. "What happened?" The girl's eyes began to water. "Danny, what happened?"

* * *

**Starting a fanfiction at the end of summer doesn't come off as a really bright idea to Borrow.  
See how long this story lasts?  
**

**There won't be a long wait for chapter two, if reader is interested. Wrote half before posting this.  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Borrow can't write fight scenes. **

** Will get to why there was a pipeline full of CO eventually.**

**

* * *

**

Chapter 2: 

If someone knew that Daniel was going to die, no one alerted him. The race to his fate started on a Friday.

Tucker finally found a girl, Danny never bothered to get her name he realized, that convinced the obsessive geek to go out for a night, so he had the apartment to himself until tomorrow. Which, in a nutshell, meant loud music his best friend wasn't fond of and some time alone to do his college homework without disturbance, spectral or otherwise.

At about nine that night, it was ruined. Most of the ghosts that regularly wreck havoc on his life did not know where he now lived, since it was not near a ghost portal, and gave up on surprise attacks. Skulker, however, could always be counted on to track someone down when he wanted to.

A second's preparation was all Danny had with his ghost sense before the technology-dependent ghost blasted one of the apartment windows open and flew inside. "Was that really necessary?" the boy asked while going ghost, the familiar blue ring crawling up and down his body. "Can't you just phase through the wall like a normal dead person?"

"You know I have a flair for the dramatic when it comes to locating prey," Skulker replied.

"Right. Well, let's get this over with, unless you want to write my paper." He formed a ball of ectoplasm and shot it at his enemy, only for it to miss and crash through the calendar on the wall, and the wall itself. Well, Sam didn't like the provocative pictures on that thing, so she'd at least be happy about that. Tucker on the other hand, will be disappointed in the termination of Miss April; she was his favorite.

Skulker shot several rockets out of his arm, which the Phantom dodged with ease. Only, they turned before hitting the wall behind him and launched again. "That's new," he pointed out as one whizzed past his ear and through the broken window. "Did you install those just for me?"

"As a matter of fact, I did. I'm glad you noticed." The ghost had taken it upon itself to sit down in one of the chairs and watch the show. "Heat sensitive, so they won't go after me again like in that trick you pulled last time."

"Shame," Danny gave a mock shake of his head, "I was hoping you'd never learn." He flew and punched Skulker out of the chair and onto the floor. The resident of the apartment below then began hitting their ceiling with a broom as a signal to shut up with the loud racket.

The ghost rubbed his mechanical head and then aimed at Phantom, only to smirk and put the weapon away. "What was that for?" He began to ask, only for a heat-seeking rocket to graze his left side. "Ah."

"Wait for it," Skulker told him.

The boy grabbed his wound, now bleeding a mixture of ectoplasm and blood, and stood back up. He watched the rocket spin around in the air and face him again. It was aimed at his heart. "Shit!" He blasted the rocket into smithereens mid-air. "I hate your weapons!" Another one of the cursed little things whizzed at him, and another. Each one was taken out with an ectoplasmic ball of anger.

"Well," his enemy started, "I didn't expect them to break that easily." The heat sensitively must have made them more prone to damage. "I should be going now." He began to phase back out of the wall.

Danny grabbed the ghost and threw him back inside. "No, you aren't. You started this, _I'm _ending it." He held the ghost down on the floor as he began forming very dangerous-looking energy in his hand.

Skulker tried to shrug him off in order to get away. "I believe you're taking this a little too seriously today," he said before launching a dull missile at the boy's stomach. Phantom was blasted into the ceiling, but not before he shot the energy, only narrowing missing the intended target. Merely being close to it damaged his armored exoskeleton, luckily not to a critical level as it tore through three floors and a basement immediately after. The prey was too risky today. He whipped out the jet-powered airplane wings. "I will be back to mount your head on my wall, Phantom."

Knocked almost to the point of being unconscious, Danny did not follow. He could only struggle to get up and yell furiously at the retreating ghost.

He changed back into Fenton, and sorely looked around at the damage. Three walls resembled Swiss cheese at parts, Tucker's favorite chair was smoking, junk was scattered haphazardly on the floor, and there was a hole that broke through the cement in the _basement_. Probably hit a water pipe, he observed. Maybe one of the neighbors' cats.

He didn't investigate. It wouldn't have mattered if he did. No one could see or smell the deadly gas.

The neighbor below had long since stopped whacking the ceiling with their broom. Some strings had been pulled when Danny moved in so that none of the other apartment residents questioned anything that happened on the third floor, just in case. Also, any damage extending from said floor would not have to be paid by them, which helped slow complaints. Tucker had the power to do some really useful things.

Exhausted, the boy cleaned up the mess as best as he could and then placed a phone call. Someone would be by to fix the holes on Monday. Normally, everything would be relatively fixed by tomorrow afternoon, but the repairmen weren't big fans of working on a Saturday. He couldn't blame them.

Tucker was going to have a fit with him when he comes home tomorrow, Danny realized. Skulker, and himself, cut a few of the _very important_, labeled cords on the floor. The holes his best friend could deal with. The calendar he'd get over. But you don't mess with that kid's technology.

He sighed. A long shower would do him good. Screw the paper he was supposed to be doing. Fresh clothes and a good night's rest were more important.

Sleep came easy.

Somewhere a floor below, someone's monoxide detector began beeping. Unheard and too late.

* * *

The sun had not risen yet when Danny woke up. It was a sudden, abrupt transference to reality, one that resulted in him sitting up and rubbing his fingers through his hair. Did he have a bad dream? Couldn't remember it. Didn't matter. He was awake now.

He felt like shit. That was expected after a few heat-seeking rockets and a missile to the stomach. Never the less, it was not the most comfortable thing to wake up feeling.

Half-awake the boy grudgingly walked into the kitchenette and fumbled with the twisty tie keeping the bread from his greedy mitts. Once accomplished, two slices made their way into the toaster to cook while he washed his face in the bathroom to wake up. An unexpected sight greeted the boy.

White hair and glowing eyes were reflected on the other side of the mirror. Did Danny go ghost in his sleep again? It had happened before, during a particularly frightening nightmare once. Took an hour of Sam's coaxing to convince him that no, Plasmius did not team up with that wretched ten years later Dan Phantom and pretty much kill everyone.

He concentrated on turning back. The blue line formed around his middle as usual, but fizzed out right after. Man, he was_ not _awake today. Too tired to change forms.

Well, might as well clean up his room and make his bed. It was rather useless to try brushing his teeth or getting dressed right now. Besides, Tucker might bring his girl over with him when he gets back, and Danny would like to at least not come off as a slob.

A slob that blasts holes in the walls. You just couldn't explain some things away.

Walking up to his room, he realized the door was closed. He had phased through it without noticing. The knob felt warm compared to his ghostly skin, and twisted with ease. A draft wafted in as the door opened. In his bed, Danny Fenton was still sleeping comfortably in his bed. "Oh, that's why I couldn't change back. I was in here the whole time." That explained it.

Wait, what?

He ran to his bed. Carefully, his eyes thoroughly searched the Danny in front of him. Everything in the room was shaking; no that was just him. In the distance, the toaster popped, forgotten. He lifted himself by the shoulders, only to have the head roll to the side. Phantom slapped the side of his face. "Wake up, damn you."

Danny Fenton wasn't sleeping.

Danny Fenton was dead.

The ghost dropped his body back onto the bed and began pacing around the room. What could he do? Was it possible to un-die? Wake up with both halves together again and just go on with his day?

The beginning of sunrise peeked through the window. He came up with Plan A: get himself back together.

Determined, Danny walked back over to the bed with its recently disturbed covers. His body laid helplessly sprawled, waiting. He became intangible and jumped in.

For a second, it worked. He could feel himself regaining motor control; his fingers twitched, eyelids fluttered. Then, the ghost was thrown out of the body like a reject toy out of a small child's hands. He hit the opposite wall and slumped onto the floor in pain.

Plan B. He did not come up with one while thinking of the first one, as being an optimist made him hope it wouldn't be necessary. But, of course, it was. Nothing came to mind.

Sitting on his bedroom floor, panic began to set in, clouding any reasonable thought. He was dead. All the way this time, not half, not partially, not a close call. Where did that leave him? What happened to his future? Gloved hands began digging into his legs. He huddled together tightly, as if it would help the feeling of vulnerability.

The sound of sirens brought him back to reality. Danny got up and walked to the window and looked out. An ambulance and two police cars pulled up to the front of the building. It would be a matter of time before they came inside and found him. Can't have questions, no matter how much easier it would be to stay where he was and wait for the authorities.

Quickly, he phased through his bedroom door and bolted for the entrance of his apartment, only to trip on loose paper lying about the floor. The ghost's head made impact with the thin flooring as a page of calendar, that month's, floated gracefully onto his face.

Pissed, he was about to blast an ectoplasmic hole through it when he noticed the date. The fourteenth. Didn't Jazz call saying she was coming over at some absurdly early time today?

Jazz. That's it.

Plan B was formed: be a good ghost and wait for his older sister to come and sort this mess out.

Phantom stood back up, blasted a hole in the calendar page anyway, and rubbed his head in pain. There had to a good foot of concrete under the thin carpeting. It occurred to him that leaving via the front door was not brightest idea to remain inconspicuous.

A wave of intangibility washed over him, and he sunk past the other residents until he reached the first floor.

Silence cradled this person's apartment like an infant, disturbed by the turning of dust the ghost made by entering. It belonged to a hoarder; a collection of old newspapers was stacked in several piles by the bathroom door, old video game consoles collected dust by two unplugged televisions in the center of the room, stuffed animals from carnival dates tumbled off an already crowded shelf. It was eerie, unnerving, and Danny accidentally bumped into a slightly open closet door as he backed up from the mess. Balled-up clothes and an ironing board poured out with an intense desire for freedom, and it took the skill of someone who's been narrowly missing dangerous objects for years to dodge it.

He gently padded onward, unsure which way he would come out if he were to simply phase out of the place.

It wasn't long, even in a needlessly crowded place like that, to find the resident. A middle-aged man, balding with a sickly skin color, was lying face-down on his computer keyboard at a desk. The piece of electronics was still on, humming, waiting for its next command. One that wouldn't come. He cautiously approached the man, though the back of his mind said it wasn't necessary. He was sleeping the same way Danny Fenton was; forever.

The sight sent chills down the ghost's already freezing spine. Was... everyone in the complex like this? Why was he the only ghost? His sense should have gone off by now if there was someone else who didn't pass over.

In a way, it made sense. Two bodies discovered so far, both looking as if they simply took a nap. It was, he had to admit, a very peaceful way a person could go. Slowly in the night, no regrets, just vaguely looking forward to a nonexistent tomorrow. A ghost couldn't possibly be made from this, there was no powerful emotion involved, no lingering desire. Just him.

The man's apartment door opened. Two figures wrapped in haz-mat suits walked in with several meters, which beeped rapidly. He turned invisible before they noticed. "Jesus," the first one said, "this thing is off the charts." A male voice, indicating his meter.

"But what on earth could possibly cause this kind of leakage of carbon monoxide?" The second voice, female, questioned. Ah, CO. A gas leak. That explained a lot.

"Well, we have the figure that out and stop it so the police can actually do something." The male figure walked around in a circle, as if the source would appear out of thin air. "Sweet Mary, this room is cold."

Unnoticed, an invisible ghost phased through the floor into the basement.

Danny saw immediately the hole he made from his room fighting Skulker last night for two reasons. One, light was entering the dank, underground space through the ceiling. Two, there was a spot of broken concrete directly below the natural spotlight.

Curious, he flew over to inspect the damage. It was rather dark between the chunks of cement, so he had to insert a glowing, energy green hand into the ghost-made hole to see clearly. Revealing a broken pipe.

"Huh," he said, "that's probably what those haz-mat people are looking for." He invisibly phased back into the first-floor apartment, noticing how neat his and Tucker's was in comparison, only to find the people had moved on in their search.

He didn't have to look far, however. The securely covered figures had only moved into the apartment across the hall. The male voice, the one complaining about the temperature earlier, seemed to notice Danny's presence, if only on a subconscious level. "Did it just get colder in here?"

"You're imagining things," the female voice replied. The haz-mat suits covered everything about them, making even their faces nonexistent. The ghost couldn't help but hope by her voice that she was hot though. A simple thing to take his mind off a specific corpse on the third floor.

He floated over to the figure inspecting the room with another meter, the male he thought. In his ear he whispered just audibly, "You should check the basement."

As expected, the haz-mat suit jumped quite noticeably. It would actually be a little unnerving if he didn't react to faceless voices. "What?" his partner asked.

"Jesus," he breathed, trying to grab his chest through the layers of protective material. "Nothing, nothing. This place just creeps me out."

"Tell me about it," the female voice replied. "We've only been to a few rooms so far, but all the bodies are so peaceful it's eerie." She pointed at a couple on the couch that Danny did not notice until then. Cuddled together under a blanket after what seemed to be a movie night. It could have just as easily been Danny and Sam, if she didn't have just as much college homework as he did last night.

"Hey, um," the male voice started, nervously rubbing the back of his covered head, "maybe we should check the basement before we go upstairs. You know, get that over with first."

His partner nodded. "Good idea." They made their way to the door and out into the hallway.

Danny echoed a sigh. The blinds were closed in this apartment; he should really get outside and find a safe place to wait for Jazz. It was hard to tell how many authorities had showed up just by the noise, and who knows how big their search area was going to be. Really, he shouldn't have even stuck around to help those meter people, it was only a matter of time before they went to the basement anyway-

The sound of the apartment door opening again breached the ghost's thoughts. A covered head poked through the doorway. "Hellooo?" It was the male voice, echoing through the room. What did he want? "Um, Mr. Spirit-voice-thing? Just wanted to say thanks for the... advice. Sorry to disturb your, uh, afterlife slumber with our noise. Working, you know. Doing the 'ol job. Um, bye." His babbling dying on the walls was the only sound in the entire apartment. The haz-mat began again as he slowly closed the door again, this time to himself. "Oh heck, what am I thinking? Spirits giving directions to random people, what nonsense. I'm a lunatic just for trailing it back here. What was I expecting, the blinds to rattle as acknowledgment or something? I'm a crazy little sucker. Maybe the monoxide is leaking through the suit somehow, making me hear voices..."

The door snapped shut.

Acknowledgment? The blinds rattling? He was Danny Phantom, he could do better than that. "You're welcome," he called out.

The door immediately opened, all the way this time. The figure took up the doorway; it seemed he hardly moved two feet from the apartment before the response. "What? What the-?"

"You-are-welcome," Danny said again, enunciating so the guy would stop thinking he was hearing things. He crossed his invisible arms in annoyance. Only a small smile betrayed the gesture. A simple distraction from death.

The haz-mat fist-pumped. "Ah-hah, I'm not crazy! Wait until I tell Beth about this! A real ghost!" Beth most likely being his partner he ditched in the basement. The door closed a final time.

Left alone in a building of corpses, Phantom took a final glance at the couple on the couch before phasing out of the building. He appeared in some sort of side street, one that smelled just slightly less rank than an alley and was more crowded with junk than an actual piece of useful road. He recalled lightly that Tucker was mugged in one of these once.

Police begun taping the area around the entire front of the complex, and the street began to swell with cars coming to and fro. Panic reappeared, followed by nausea, and when the contents of his ghostly stomach were emptied, sorrow fell on him like a brick.

The ghost staggered to a spot on the ground behind a refrigerator box and slid down into something that resembled the fetal position. He felt utterly helpless, an emotion that finally emerged a half hour after waking up dead.

All he had to do, he reminded himself, was keep a lookout for his sister. The sun had fully risen by now, meaning it was seven or something. It didn't matter what time it was. She was going to show up and get him. Fix him like she always did.

Wait for Jazz.

Peek over the box; no sign of her car.

It was OK to be helpless as long as he could do this one little thing.

The haz-mat people emerged from the complex triumphant.

Wait for Jazz.

More cars arrived, this time an ambulance. Medical staff starting taking body bags outside into their vehicle.

Just wait a little longer.

A car slowed down while passing by the scene. It looked like his sister's, but probably not.

Ten more minutes.

The car came back; it was indeed her. Danny had never been so relieved to see her. He had also never been so tired, as if he would just collapse into himself right here in the alley.

Here the girl comes now.

The wait for Jazz had taken an hour.

* * *

**Flashback over. No, Tucker is not dead, see? How many characters do you think this writer would kill in one chapter? Not that cruel.  
Had this ready to go for a couple days, but did not want to post until writing a certain amount of chapter three. Proved quite difficult to Borrow, yes it did.**


End file.
